Profiles:
Dana Waldman

Dana Waldman

MBA 95

Founder, Waldman and Associates

Giving Back to GGU in Every Way He Can

Dana Waldman is the principal of the consulting firm that bears his name, frequent
adjunct professor in Golden Gate University's MBA and EMBA programs, and chairman
of the university Board of Trustees. "It's been extremely gratifying to make a shift
in my own life. I started teaching, then I was invited to join the Business School
Advisory Board, and finally the Board of Trustees. By then I had a business life and
a Golden Gate life."

Waldman started teaching a few classes at the Golden Gate campus where he had earned
his degree back when he was a rising star at Loral, a defense company that had bought
Ford Aerospace and would later be acquired by Lockheed Martin. Ultimately, he would
take the skills he'd acquired and move out on his own, first to lead a large high-tech
company, then as CEO of numerous start-ups, and as a consultant. I did that because
I was getting pulled in many directions. I've been a turnaround guy, an investor,
and a deal maker. I've done liquidation work. I've done a whole lot of things over
the years all of which have been leveraging my experience. What I like to do best
is to come into companies and help them reinvent themselves into higher growth markets.
It's not a lot different than what I used to do in defense; it's the same skill set,
and Ive been practicing that skill set for twenty-plus years. The first half, I was
practicing it with a big company, now I practice it on lots of companies, but it's
basically the same.

After graduating from Tulane with a degree in Electrical Engineering, Waldman came
out west to work, eventually ending up at Ford Aerospace. Dana began to rise through
the ranks, but while he had demonstrated a lot of natural acumen for business, the
young engineer had no formal business education. The big boss took him aside and advised
Waldman to formalize his skills and get an MBA to complement his engineering degree,
adding, "Call Golden Gate." The next day Dana Waldman did just that.

At the time, Golden Gate had a facility in Los Altos and a cohort-based MBA program
was starting. Twenty sleepless months later, Dana Waldman had his MBA. Although his
office was still at Loral in the Silicon Valley, much of his work kept him commuting
between Washington, D.C. and California. He remembers his biggest problem was communicating
with other students about group projects. "Obviously now it's very easy to share documents,
but back then it was a real challenge, so I always tell people that it was a great
program but I didn't sleep for two years."

Reflecting on his program, Dana observes two distinct perspectives, which he calls
the value at the time and the value with some distance. "At the time, I would say
I was like a sponge. I was excited to soak up learning and to work on different skills
that I didn't have at the time. I had good business acumen and by then I had accomplished
quite a bit in my career, but I had not formalized a lot of the skills. It was clear
to me that if I was going to continue to advance, there would be some basic blocking
and tackling skills that I would need to master. But more importantly, I needed to
refine my intuitive business acumen. I also wanted to make the program relevant to
what I was doing at work. Each time I had a project, I tried to have some parallel
to what was going on at work."

He recalls one business law project in which he decided to write a paper on intellectual
property piracy, only to learn that his own company had no such policy in place. "So
the next thing you know, I helped put together a task force to develop the company's
policy on intellectual property piracy. So I think with an MBA program like the one
we have at Golden Gate, where a lot of our students are working professionals, you
get out what you put into it."

"The most important thing I got out of the MBA program was a new way to think. In
business, you deal with complex multi-variable problems: organizational issues, political
issues, technical issues, financial issues, all complicated problems that require
you to hone your critical thinking skills. You need the ability to walk into a complicated
situation and ascertain which are the top issues that must be addressed, how to put
a plan together to address them and how to execute that plan. Those are skills you
learn in the MBA program, and they really serve us well in business."

Now he teaches mostly graduate business students and corporate executives who seek
his advice on how to guide their companies successfully. He consults with start-up
companies as well as those who need to reinvent themselves as a higher growth market.
"The work is interesting and crosses virtually all technology markets. I've run all
kinds of things from space to voice recognition to optical modules to media and technology
to social networking. You get lucky sometimes, but you also have to recognize when
an opportunity is in front of you, and that sometimes is the hardest thing to do.
Many times things that don't look like opportunities actually are. Then you have to
do something about it -- take some action and work your fanny off."

GGU President Dan Angel got to know Dana early after his arrival in the Spring of
2007. Dana was tapped to be the alumni representative of the Presidents Blue Horizons
Team. In just four months, that team of twenty people developed new programs for the
university that have brought in more than a million dollars in new revenue. Dana was
a big part of that success, so Dan called on his leadership again and again. Eventually
Dana was invited to join the Board of Trustees where he served as chairman.